Always And Never
by Vaecordia
Summary: And it's in that moment that I do everything I can not to shout your name, not to scream for you to come back, not to break down and fall apart right in front of you, lay my feelings and thoughts bare. So I don't. And you walk away. (Warnings inside, based on Tumblr prompts. America x anyone)


**Warnings:** uhm right so my characterisation here isn't pleasant. Lying, dark thoughts, bottled-up feelings, mentions of alcohol abuse, sickness, vomit, passing out (all of these unrelated to each other though), language warning, major warnings for eating and sleeping disorder, and some other stuff. But it's not happy. Unhappy relationship with an oblivious party, you might see what I mean.

Tbh it's really mainly America x anyone, but I mean I had RusAme in my mind as I wrote this (as can be guessed from the minor historical references and the 'sunflower' bit).

Inspired by a bunch of prompts on Tumblr - each first sentence one prompt.

Have something bittersweet.

* * *

 _i._ "How are you feeling?"

You look at me with a worried look in your eyes, but I never turn mine to you. I refuse to meet that worried gaze, that want to help - help something broken and bent beyond repair. You always say you're as broken as I am, and maybe once you were. But not any more. I am the one who's broken now, I am the one who fell off the edge, who is torn and ripped apart in more ways than one. And yet, there you stand, your eyes pressing on me, into me, too deep - I can feel myself shrinking away, shying from you. And the question hangs in the air, unanswered, before I realise that and start to think of an answer.

It's on my tongue, on my lips, the truth nearly spilling as words unwanted nearly flow from my mind. Except it's not a river of words, it's a torrent, it's ugly, violent, terrible - as I suppose is everything else about me.

And then I can feel the answer curling in on itself, a snake that rests in the pit of my stomach, lurking, resting. Threatening, but never biting. Because its biting words would end up killing me.

And I look up at you, my eyes full of confusion, an artificial brightness alight in them, a facade of puzzlement masking my face. I pause, before a smile breaks out on my lips, an infectious and false smile, whose disease spreads through me the broader it gets. It's a sick smile, too false and too bright and too sweet, but it's the perfect amount of everything.

You don't notice any of this.

"I'm great, why're you askin'?"

You smile, soft and sweet and gentle, in a truthful and pure way. It breaks my heart a little every time I see it, and soon there won't be any heart left to break.

"Nothing," you say, and turn away. And it's in that moment that I do everything I can not to shout your name, not to scream for you to come back, not to break down and fall apart right in front of you, lay my feelings and thoughts bare.

So I don't. And you walk away.

* * *

 _ii._ "Where are you going?"

"To walk it off," I fire as I pull on my coat and slam outside the room. I can still feel your eyes on me, as I can feel theirs, even when the door flings shut behind me. I don't see, hear, feel, I run or walk, find an elevator, stairs, I don't know any more? It's only when I reach outside that I realise I can't see, that my eyes have blurred with unshed tears - unwanted tears. And still I continue walking, running, moving, far away as I can from you, from your clear eyes, from your loving, beautiful gaze, that makes me hurt every time I see it. The pain digs deeper every hour, every second, and it's better when you're not there, not there to remind me of what I could be, could have been, but never will be.

A better person, better friend, better lover.

But I'm not, and I keep that to myself, lying to you, trying to seem like I'm worthy of you. And it's when you ask the smallest of questions that I can't face you, when your attention shifts to me that I can't think straight.

I'm outside, I'm standing in the middle of the street, a car swerves past me - I almost shout for it to turn around and drive back, do what it didn't, because it's not like I can die anyway, it's not like this can end any time soon, it's not like -

But I don't, I hold back just like I always do, I don't call back, I never do. And someone shouts for me to get off the road, to watch out before I'm run over, and I mindlessly drag myself off the tunnel, the only light at the end of which would a been a set of headlights. And I finish crossing, I'm across the street from where our meeting building is, and I don't turn back for fear of seeing you standing there, calling for me, waiting for me, coming to take me back. I walk down the street, my feet lead me I don't know where. I just walk, I don't think, I see the sidewalk like a conveyor belt under my feet, driving me away from them, away from you.

And when I stop, the sidewalk's changed into grass, a vibrant green that dulls in my eyes. The street has become a small path, the lampposts trees, looming above me. And I take in the sights all around me, trying to make sense of why I'm here, why my mind led me here, why my feet drove me here. And I see the bench, the old, worn-down, dark wood bench, that's been there for probably decades, some bits eaten by a few termites, held by looping iron arms and legs. And it's the one that faces the lake, and I see the ducks sitting around, leaving a rippling trail behind them in the light grey sheen of the water. The sky above me is meek, the green leaves of the trees bright against it. A veil of clouds hangs from the sky, and it at some points it has an almost ethereal lining to it. And I turn back to the bench, stare at it with a gaze as blank as I can muster.

It's the bench where we would always come to, whether it be in summer, autumn, winter or spring. Whenever I would want to drag you out in the winter away from the warmth of the heating of my apartment to experience the first snow fall of the year in New York, whenever you would want to walk around and breathe in the soft scent of spring, whenever we would come in summer because there was shade here, under the trees, or we would throw freshly fallen leaves at each other in autumn. I feel the wind brush against my cheek, a chapped kiss of winter - and I imagine your hand there, your gentle touch instead of the dull breeze. And I turn away, but everywhere I look, all I see is memories. And I realise, even if I didn't want you to see me now as I am, I would always see us as we could be.

* * *

 _iii._ "You look like shit."

I'm tempted to answer. To give you the sarcastic answer you expect, want, need to hear from me. A snarky insult to how you look, a pathetic jab we both know I don't mean - because we both know you don't mean that either - not completely. In your eyes, I'm the most beautiful person on Earth. In your eyes, I am all the beauty of nature personified, representing all that is good, warm, beautiful. I was always told I was quite the artist, painting better than most. Only, I used my eyes and my face as my canvas, words as my paint.

You might have said that as a joke, a way to rile me up and get an answer from me. You might have meant it as reminiscing of times now gone. But I know you said that because you now truly saw that your dearest, most beautiful sunflower, and now that I'm not, now that you see my superficial pain that betrays only little of how I feel, it is now that I know I'm crumbling apart. If I can't even keep the simplest of things, my facade, my persona, intact, how could I hold the world together?

And you see the paint chipping away, the smile fading and my eyes dulling. And you worry, God, you worry so much - for someone that deserves none of it. If I suffer, it is nothing but my own fault. If I'm in pain, it's from wounds I've caused myself. But you think it's you, you think it's them, the others, and I let you think that. If I didn't, what would happen? Would you lose all hope in me? Would you try to convince me I'm wrong? Would you try to have me committed, because to you I'm not making any sense? Would you try to heal me, would you try to help, would you furrow your brows in confusion, would you shout in anger, cry in desperation, walk away in silence? And I know that even if seeing me like this hurts you, knowing the reality behind my pain would cut even deeper.

I know you don't notice the simplest things, because I don't let you notice them. Every meal we eat, you always tell me off for speaking with my mouth full, and eating too fast, because it's the things we do. But you don't see me later in the evening, or right afterwards, heaving my stomach dry into the sink, because I can't hold anything down. And every time you lay next to me, and wrap your arms around me, you feel my heavy breathing and soft heartbeat and soon your breath evens out, too. But you don't see my eyes skitter about in the darkness of the room, awaiting for something to jump out, you don't see my mind whirring at a thousand miles an hour because I can't shut down, I can't slow it down and I'm permanently awake. When I come out of the shower, you always like to latch on to me for a moment and bask in the warmth radiating off me, the sweet scent of my hair. But you didn't see me almost scrubbing my skin raw, trying to eradicate and tear away all of my pain, all of my guilt. When I drive around with you, we laugh and sing along to the radio and jab at each other. But you don't see how my fingers tighten around the steering wheel at every turn, because I'm too jumpy and too easily scared. When we're meeting other people, having a friendly chat, and I laugh boisterously and you look at me happily. But you don't notice that my fidgeting isn't just because I have too much pent up energy, that my laugh isn't pure.

But I can't blame you, I could never blame you for that. If anything, it's my own fault for blinding you to these, for shutting you out and sealing you out of my mind and my life. It's my fault for letting you live in this illusion of happiness for so long, for letting you think you were my life. For letting you think I was safe, I was fine, that I deserve you. Because of one thing I am certain - and you don't deserve the pain I carry with me, that might spill all over you if I'm not careful enough.

* * *

 _iv._ "When was the last time you slept?"

I'm tempted to answer. There were so many things I could have said to that, and all of them would probably have been lies to some extent. But I was confused by your question, too. Did you mean sleep, as in the peaceful slumber that wafts over you at night, as you lay in the dark and dream the hours away? Or did you mean sleep, as in the hollow numbness that takes over when my head hits the pillow? Or sleep, the half-rest I get when my mind works a thousand miles per hour but I'm not quite awake?

I can't remember when the last time I had a dream was. I can't even remember what the dream was. But I know I used to dream a lot about you, once upon a time. But now, all I get is broken images and shattered mirrors of reality that just barely reflect what goes on in my mind, incoherent memories that aren't quite real that remind me of things I want to forget. It's all muddled mess now, a haze I can't make sense or come out of. I can feel it chipping away at my mind.

I have the option of telling you about the nights I spend alone, entangled into my bed sheets and unable to move. Paralysed, held back by a force beyond me. I could tell you about how my bed has been gathering dust for the last week or two, unused and unopened, because I can't lie down without memories flooding my thoughts. I could tell you about how many times I've had to change the lamp on my desk - the sleepless nights I spend hunched over my desk and the next week's paperwork, and on the few nights I manage to wear myself out enough, the lamp ends up on the floor. I could tell you about all this, but really - you're better off not knowing, not worrying. It's my mistakes that haunt me, and you're just not enough to help me.

"I've been a bit busy, you know, but I do catch up on whatever sleep I lose," I say, the words chopped and rough.

I will catch up on the sleep I lose, some day. Just probably not in the way you understood my words. Not in the way you think. Probably in a sleep I won't come back from. (Hopefully.)

* * *

 _v._ "Breathe."

I almost don't hear you over the heavy sound of my own breathing - wheezing and heaving and unsteady and ragged. I can feel my chest constricting and locking my breath in and squeezing it out. It's copper that fills my mouth, with a tang of iron in a cacophony of tastes. And then it's the bile that rises, the sick feeling that has me scrambling for the bathroom before I'm lurching over the sink. I can barely see what's happening, the sick spiraling down the drain in sallow trails. I can taste sulfur and smoke in my lungs, wringing them with toxic claws.

You call out, and I can't hear you - you say something, and I heave again.

I don't wonder where the illness came from. It just did. I've accepted that. You don't. You ask and you ask and you ask, questions I can't hear (won't hear).

You want to know whether it's a passing illness, whether it's something my citizens are getting infected with. I don't have the heart to tell you it's my citizens causing it, it's my people's lifestyle that is killing them, that is tainting their lungs and lining them with poison. I don't have the heart to tell you it's my own fault for not investing more into clean energies, for letting my country's financial greed blind me to my illness - if I produce more, _more,_ then there can't be any problems - supply, demand, every need and every want met, doesn't matter how, just _how much_.

And I sink to the floor, holding my head in my hands, murmuring empty reassurances to you. Your worried gaze flickers over me, the ghost of your hands tentative on my shoulder, your words dying away, my mind swimming.

And those empty reassurances do nothing, they deepen your frown, they deepen my grave.

* * *

 _vi._ "How many fingers am I holding up?"

I try to focus - I really do, but I find I can't. The haze clouding my mind, it won't go away - it's extended to my eyes, and the world is blurry and it tilts and I can't tell north from south. But it hasn't tilted, and I'm standing, precariously on the edge of a cliff and I can feel myself tipping. Except you catch me, again and again and again, and you repeat the question that I still don't hear, that I might not ever hear. I look for your eyes, and I meet them - and they burn through me, they hurt _so much_ and I try to look away. But I can't, I'm transfixed by your pleading look, and you search for an answer I can't give.

"How many fingers am I holding up?"

I'm holding on to something, long enough to straighten myself upright enough to see you - but these days, I never really see you, do I? I just look around you, look through you, never at you. And now, when I look at you, I just look at the - two, three, I can't count them - fingers, they're too close and yet you're too far, and I can't reach you, but you keep repeating the damn question, and I have to answer something - so I spout out a random number, and I can't remember whether it's two or seventy. Of the few things I remember of that night, I remember the look of worry, of fear, of disappointment, of care that you gave me.

You're torn between letting me fend for myself, the way I deserve to - find my own bed and get myself into it - or helping me, because you were always too kind to me, too forgiving. I never deserved you, and I try to tell you that, but it seems that the alcohol shrouding my breath does little to help my credibility. And then you hold me, keep me upright when we make our way to the bedroom - our bedroom, because even if I am the worst person alive at the moment, and I know so, you let me sleep in our bed.

And in the morning, you'll ask me what was I thinking. You'll want to know how I managed to get so drunk I could barely stand up. How I lost myself so much that I ended up like this. And in the morning, I'll dodge and avoid your questions, twisting my way out of your words' grasp with oiled lies and slick dismissals, ignoring and laughing it off. And I'll keep at it long enough until you either relent and let it be, let it slide because you don't have the energy to fight me over this or glare at me and huff and fall silent and ignore me for the rest of the day to show me your contempt. But I'll weather it, I'll endure it because I brought it upon myself. After all, that's preferable than you knowing I got so trashed because I was overwhelmed, by you and myself and everyone and everything, that I drank myself to oblivion to forget - another failure, another one that just adds to the ever-prolonging list of failures of mine. (Because I'm still here.)

I tried to forget you, even for a moment. But I found that though I nearly forgot how to count, how to speak and almost even my own name, the one clear thing on my mind - it just had to be you.

* * *

 _vii._ "Don't stand up yet."

Your hands are wrapped around my arm, holding me in a vice-like grip. You're holding onto me for dear life, as if it were you who fell, who was falling, and not I. It is only now that I hear the shout you let out when I lapsed for a moment, blackness drowning my eyes and mind for just a minute, my knees buckling and my glass shattering and my body faltering.

I can't really see what's around me, but I can see the blurred outlines of your face - and I can see the deep lines of worry dredged into it. You wave something in front of my eyes. It glints - it's my glasses. I give a weak smile (it's not really a smile, but you mistake it as such - you always do, and I always want you to), and I haphazardly place them on my face.

Now everything's clear again, and I hate it - it's too bright, too clear, too defined, too real, and I loathe it. A moment's respite, a moment of dark, and now I'm back to normal and the weakness I showed has to go. You tell me not to stand, but I'm on my feet, because there's nothing else I can do.

I always have to stand, tall and proud and safe and protective and _constant_ , shouting illusions of freedom from brittle rooftops, screaming for a broken liberty. A dismantling society, falling to pieces, dividing and dividing into smaller pieces until there's nothing left. It's worse now than it was two hundred years ago - because at least then, I was at war, I wasn't confused, and there was the safety of the blackouts. My people, though divided, stood on one side alone - but now it's each to their own.

But I stand, with my empty promises and hollow hopes and twisted dreams, and I smile that same smile and carry that same look. Because you need me as a constant, and you're the closest to a constant I can get.

And you look on, worried, your eyes trailing after me, careful to pick up on a single misstep. Which you won't, because I walk straight, and tall, and proud, as I always do. As I always did.

* * *

 _viii._ "Why didn't you tell me earlier?!"

So many things flash through my mind, and I don't know which to pick. There are so many half-truths, lies, truths, hurtful things and nice things I could say, soft and sweet and gentle excuses and deep, scathing lies and I'm lost again, in my thoughts, trying to explain something I know nothing about. There was nothing to tell, nothing to say that wouldn't be useless garbage anyway, but even if I tried to tell you that, it wouldn't help. You always thought all words were worthy, that no speech was garbage - but then again, we never did agree on many things, did we?

I could tell you there was nothing to say, nothing to tell, but that's a lie, because I hide everything. I could say I didn't know what to say, but there were so many things I could have said _anything_ (but I didn't, I never do).

But the words clench in my throat, twist my lungs, and no words come out.

You look at me, helpless, hurt, and waiting - waiting for an answer I should give.

"Why?"

Your voice is soft, small, broken. Your eyes are hurt, lost, caring. All I can do is stand, passive and silent and full of lies I won't voice.

The only truth is that I didn't want to tell you, and that's the last thing you want to hear. I'm always making excuses for what you want to hear and what you don't, and it's too comfortable for me - i can't let that excuse go, because I need to know I know best. I need to know I have a reasoning. A valid explanation. I need to convince myself of it, I need to _know_ it.

(But I don't, really, I can't convince myself, I never have been able to. And so I pretend I have an excuse.)

* * *

 _ix._ "Let me help you!"

It's as if with those words, you hope every problem will spill from me, and you can pick up every piece and put it all together. It's all dust, running through my fingers - but you haven't seen the dust, and you don't know there's nothing more to it.

And I want to scream at you, to shout at you for your stupid ideals, your too-pure innocence - even though I know we've both done terrible things, horrible atrocities, here you stand, and you look at me and beg with such kindness that I don't know what to say. I want to laugh at you for thinking I can be helped, laugh at you for being so damn stupid. I want to cry, and let you hug me, hold me dearly - as if nothing else matters. But it does, and I do none of this, and merely look at you with a soft smile. The words slipping from my lips are gentle, soft - but they're broken, taped back together in a halfhearted attempt to mend them.

You think there's something to help. You want there to be something to salvage. You hope there's something to be mended. You want the shatters back together again - but the problem is, there's nothing left anymore. I've scattered the ashes into the cold wind. But you don't know, you don't see - you can't see, because I can't let you. It's another vice of mine, trying to make you happy, keep you happy when I know I can't. I'm trying everything I can to seem the same person I used to be, the person you fell in love with, the person you devoted your life to. I try to play pretend, but I'm running against a clock that keeps speeding up.

"There's nothing to be helped," I say, my tongue drying as the words flow from me - the irony hits me, as if those words were a liquid truth that upon leaving me, left me dry and empty. And I look at you, and you don't see the way my eyes plead for your help, how they reach out for you to save me from the grave I dig myself. You don't see it, because I don't let you. You don't see it, because it isn't there. Maybe that's why I can't be helped - there really is nothing left to save, no salvageable flotsam from the storm my mind has become, no shatters that can be glued back up in a poor imitation of who I used to be.

And your words, they're not my cry for help.

They're yours, and it hangs, alone, empty in the air.

* * *

 _x._ "Look at me – you're safe."

This time, I can look at you, into your eyes. And as I do so, I can see the love you feel for me, the caring and the want to help, I can feel them as I look at you. It's as if they seep into me, sink through my veins and trickle into my heart. But when you see my eyes, my broken eyes (windows to a destroyed soul), that's when it changes. We both feel the shift, the tilt in the balance, and I can see your expression changing. I can see that unadulterated love become tainted by horror, break apart against the tremendous strength of my turmoil. I can see how you now truly see me for who I am, perhaps for the first time. Maybe you never knew I was like this, maybe you ignored it. But as I stand here, facing you, my eyes glued to your hurt gaze, I can see that it doesn't matter. I've broken your vision of me anyway, just as everything else I touch. You're in pain, you're afraid, you worry and yet you still care, but not in the same way. You seem to finally realise that I am no longer, and have not been for a while, the same person you fell in love with. Was I ever that person? Or did you fall for the thought of me, the image I made for you?

And I can see that pain bleed on your cheeks in clear crystalline tears, my next words painful for the both of us. Maybe they were more painful for you, because I can barely feel pain any more.

Your eyes, with their last effort to hold onto the scraps of what they remember me as, plead me not to say the words, not to utter the curse, to tear another hole, to stab a new wound.

"I know _I am_."

My voice - exhausted, broken, ripped, hazy, makes the words rasped, rough, and they tear at my throat, sandpaper in my lungs, a scraping whisper that burns my tongue.

"But I know _you're not_."

* * *

 **A/N:** Ohkay this was something else! It took me over five months to write and finish and perfect, and yet I finished it right before my exams. Rejoice! But anyway, I don't have much to add for this, except I both loved and hated writing it. Oh well, such is my doom.

Hope you enjoyed it, and until next time!


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